cMP 4,1 > 5,1 Lightroom SSD? NVMe vs MICRON SATA?

[uimike]

Hi all,

Any real-life experiences with Lightroom, for media and catalog (plus previews) storage?
I'm on a cMP 2009, Xeon 3.2 GHz 6-core, quite happy with High Sierra's speed, and keeping my images and catalogs on a Micron 1100 2TB 6Gb/s internal SATA.

My boot drive is a Samsung 951 AHCI 512 GB blade, I am quite happy with it. The blade is sitting on an Angelbird Wings PX1 card.

I know the card can support NVMe blades - and there are good prices nowadays on the Samsung 970 EVO 2TB - would getting one of these for my photos and Lightroom catalogs buy me a whole lot more speed (loading images, building previews, tweaking dev settings)?

Do I need it? Of course not, it's just pure greed

Mike

 

[orph]

im still using a WD blue 2TB (spinner) for light room cs6 with no real problems , my library is only 1.2TB at the mo and only work with photos from my canon 6D and pany 4/3 gx 80 and a fuji camera i forget the model

have a large cash on my scratch drive (WD black spinner) maybe that helps?

i only edit raw files and make some changes and export for delivery, dont do tagging or anything like that and 22MP is the biggest my files are.

but i do have a simple workflow, develop a look, past it to all images, cut down to final set, do final pass on images and deliver them

and i still use bridge/ACR CS6 half the time for work, depends on the project but tends to be faster for me if i need to work fast.
relay it's mixed depends on what im doing sometimes i use them both

 

[uimike]

Thanks orph,

That is very useful. My library is exactly 1.2 TB as well - and I also use a Canon 6D! (and also an SL1). Yep, around 22MB files

From what you are saying, sounds like the disk type itself wouldn't make a huge difference - given that you are not unhappy with your setup. I do use a lot of tagging (keyboarding, actually), and that slows down things a bit. Much? Don't think so.

 

[tsialex]

Hi all,

Any real-life experiences with Lightroom, for media and catalog (plus previews) storage?
I'm on a cMP 2009, Xeon 3.2 GHz 6-core, quite happy with High Sierra's speed, and keeping my images and catalogs on a Micron 1100 2TB 6Gb/s internal SATA.

My boot drive is a Samsung 951 AHCI 512 GB blade, I am quite happy with it. The blade is sitting on an Angelbird Wings PX1 card.

I know the card can support NVMe blades - and there are good prices nowadays on the Samsung 970 EVO 2TB - would getting one of these for my photos and Lightroom catalogs buy me a whole lot more speed (loading images, building previews, tweaking dev settings)?

Do I need it? Of course not, it's just pure greed

Mike

Not with AngelBirds PX1, since any card that don't have a PCIe 3.0 switch will be limited to 1500MB/s, you can get more space, but not more speed. Read Blade SSDs - NVMe & AHCI.

 

[h9826790]

You may check activity monitor -> disk -> Data read/sec, if the disk read speed keep max at 250MB/s (the internal SATA II speed limit) when you using LR, then improve the bandwidth by upgrade to SATA III or even go for the 970 Evo should help. However, how much the difference still unknown.

But if that parameter is nowhere near max. Then the bottleneck most likely is not on the storage speed. Further improve it most likely won't speed up anything.

 

[orph]

well id gess a normal SSD will be better value

i have a dedicated WD black just as a scratch drive for all my apps and having the previews only rendered once helps a lot.
id bet even just a normal SSD (just pluged in to a normal sata plug) for a library will give a boost im sure (i hope it will let it generate multiple previews at the same time better)

and setting up a catch on a fast drive helps a lot with most apps (not to big not to small and if you hit slowdowns wipe it now and agen)

if it was me and the speed was good id save the money or if you need to spend it get a new lens you know what the new blackmagic pocket camera 4K has my eye im pricing up a cost for the unit with lens spare batterys and a usb 3 SSD
just need to see more reviews on high iso as i shoot a lot in low light but wow that will let me do what i do with still grading with video
looks like it only has about 40-50 min battery life so what 4-6 battery's needed for a shoot at least


to be fair im told people with 5Dmk4 or the nikon D800 etc with there 50mb+ files find LR slow or people doing complex alterations but iv never had real problems and i can only work so fast.

edit
you can use adobe CC /bridge ACR for free now which is cool just no guarantee that it will always be free which is a pain

 

[uimike]

You may check activity monitor -> disk -> Data read/sec, if the disk read speed keep max at 250MB/s (the internal SATA II speed limit) when you using LR, then improve the bandwidth by upgrade to SATA III or even go for the 970 Evo should help. However, how much the difference still unknown.

But if that parameter is nowhere near max. Then the bottleneck most likely is not on the storage speed. Further improve it most likely won't speed up anything.

h9826790, this is very helpful, will do - thanks!